Plymouth Colony was founded on the ideas of communal sharing. But two years of communism in practice left alive only a fraction of the original number of the Plymouth colonists. Realizing that, the elders of the colony decided to try something radically different: the introduction of private property rights and the right of the individual families to keep the fruits of their own labor.

In the New World, they wanted to erect a New Jerusalem that would not only be religiously devout but be built on a new foundation of communal sharing and social altruism. Their goal was the communism of Plato’s Republic

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Because of the disincentives and resentments that spread among the population, crops were sparse and the rationed equal shares from the collective harvest were not enough to ward off starvation and death. Two years of communism in practice left alive only a fraction of the original number of the Plymouth colonists.

Unironically doing “communism is when no food.”

In the wilderness of the New World, the Plymouth Pilgrims progressed from the false dream of communism to the sound realism of capitalism. At a time of economic uncertainty and growing political paternalism, it is worthwhile recalling this beginning of the American experiment and experience with economic freedom.

This is the lesson of the First Thanksgiving. This year, when we, Americans sit around our dining table with family and friends, we should also remember that what we are really celebrating is the birth of free men and free enterprise in that New World of America.

The true meaning of Thanksgiving, in other words, is the triumph of Capitalism over the failure of Collectivism in all its forms.

I thought that was the true meaning of Christmas?